Carthage girls roll to 70-40 win against Liberal

A quick start and a big second quarter were enough for second-seed Carthage to win its first-round game against Liberal Tuesday night in the Carl Junction Girls Basketball Classic.

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The Carthage Press

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Posted Nov. 28, 2012 at 6:35 PM
Updated Nov 28, 2012 at 6:39 PM

Posted Nov. 28, 2012 at 6:35 PM
Updated Nov 28, 2012 at 6:39 PM

A quick start and a big second quarter were enough for second-seed Carthage to win its first-round game against Liberal Tuesday night in the Carl Junction Girls Basketball Classic.

The Tigers got points from 11 different players and rolled to a 70-40 victory against the fifth-seed Bulldogs.

"It's good to see a lot of people contributing," Carthage head coach Jim Moore said. "It's fun for a lot of different girls to get to play, and when they're playing they're getting better so that was a good sign. Eleven girls scoring is fantastic, and hopefully we have a lot of games like that."

Carthage, now 2-0 after opening the season with a road win at Aurora last week, jumped out to an 8-0 lead and led by as many as 10 points in the first quarter before heading into the second quarter with an 18-10 advantage.

The lead would grow to 21 points by halftime.

Senior Chloe' Shepherd made it a nine-point game at the 5:53 mark, then baskets by junior Leigh Ann Craig and senior Emily Goeken put Carthage up 24-11, and a basket and free throw from junior Vanessa Pawlak extended the lead to 16 points.

Junior Amy Keller scored three the old fashioned way with 1:48 left in the half for a 17-point lead, freshman Maya Williams sank two free throws, Craig scored, junior Regan Gartner made a steal and scored on a lay up and Shepherd made two free throws with 20 seconds remaining and the Tigers took a 40-19 lead into the break.

The Carthage lead was 28 points, 58-30, after the third quarter, and Shepherd made it a 30-point game early in the fourth, then Craig scored and Shepherd scored on a steal and a lay up to go up by 34 points before Liberal scored three-straight baskets.

Williams scored at the 3:25 mark, junior Mariah Thrasher added two free throws and then scored the final basket of the game with 57 seconds remaining.

"I thought it was a little bit better tonight than it was our first time out," Moore said. "Maybe we got the nerves out of the way that first game. We did some good things tonight. We're pushing the ball, running in transition. We have a lot of girls running the floor and we're seeing the floor good. We're getting the ball where it needs to go and converting. We didn't necessarily do that the first game. It was a lot better effort. Defensively we can still get better and we know that, but we had some possessions where we guarded pretty well, too."

Pawlak led the Tigers with 17 points, and Keller scored 12 points off the bench.

"I really thought she played really well for us," Moore said of Keller. "She gave us a spark coming off the bench. She plays so hard and she was able to get some points and that's a big contribution from her."

Page 2 of 2 - Williams finished with 10 points, scoring six in the third quarter.

"Maya being a freshman is getting those varsity minutes," Moore said. "She had a good game for us. She aws able to get something going inside and once she got the ball she knows what to do with it."